#TreasuresofDarkness, Day 25, Jeremiah 13:23
הֲיַהֲפֹ֤ךְ כּוּשִׁי֙ עוֹר֔וֹ וְנָמֵ֖ר חֲבַרְבֻּרֹתָ֑יו גַּם־אַתֶּם֙ תּוּכְל֣וּ לְהֵיטִ֔יב לִמֻּדֵ֖י הָרֵֽעַ׃
Can the Cushite change his skin, Or the leopard his spots? Just as much can you do good, Who are practiced in doing evil! — Jeremiah 13:23
Jeremiah, the poet-prophet, seems to have had enough with the people. They continue to worship idols instead of YHVH. He tells the people that G-d will exile them, destroying them — parents and children alike. Verse 16 states, “Give honor to the L-RD your G-d before G-d brings darkness, before your feet stumble on the mountains in shadow — When you hope for light, and it is turned to darkness and becomes deep gloom.”
By the time we make it to verse 23, Jeremiah appears to be losing hope and he wants to give the people a clue about what it will really take to escape this destruction that G-d is ready to unleash. He tells them what is required is beyond surface level change. Just like it is impossible for Ethiopians to change their skin, you can’t continue to do all manner of evil thing and expect to be called good by G-d. You have work to do, internal work, that will create the change necessary for the people of Israel to be in formation, to be whole, to be liberated.
I am reminded of another poet-prophet who spoke about this very thing just a few years ago. Audre Lorde said, “For the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change. Racism and homophobia are real conditions of all our lives in this place and time. I urge each one of us here to reach down into that deep place of knowledge inside herself and touch that terror and loathing of any difference that lives here. See whose face it wears. Then the personal as the political can begin to illuminate all our choices.”
We work hard to dismantle white supremacy and all of its manifestations and then find ourselves back where we started, but this time with a different regime. Sometimes it looks like misogynoir, other times like homophobia and transphobia. We get caught up in power and privilege and forget about dismantling this system that is killing us one by one.
But Jeremiah and Audre have left us with the blueprint for creating real and lasting change. This work of healing ourselves and our community is going to take more than external touchups. We need to dig deep within, looking for those places of woundedness, pain and trauma that keep us paralyzed, apathetic and complacent. Of course an Ethiopian can’t change his skin.
Nor can we use the tools of white supremacy, oppression and inhumanity to achieve wholeness and liberation.
May we find the strength, compassion and determination to complete this work. Ken Yehi Ratzon.
